Habitat and Feeding Habits of Protozoans

Description

A class of single-celled eukaryotes known as protozoa feeds on organic matter such as other microbes, natural organs and detritus. They can be gratis or parasites. Because they frequently exhibit animal-like characteristics like movement and feeding and lack a cell wall, as found in plants and many algae, protozoans were once thought of as "one-celled creatures”. The taxon Protozoa was initially established by Georg Goldfuss as a class inside the Animalia, with the word "protozoa" meaning "early mammals." It was upgraded to various higher ranks in later classification systems, such as organisms, subkingdom and kingdom and occasionally it was placed inside Protoctista or Protista. Since the taxon "Protozoa" falls short of these requirements, it is no longer acceptable to group protozoa with mammals and consider them as closely related organisms. The phrase is still occasionally used to refer to single-celled protists (i.e., eukaryotes other than animals, plants or fungi) that feed through exaggerate. Protozoa include the Microbe, Paramecium, Cyanobacteria and Trematodes genus.

Clean, muddy and salt water, as well as other wet environments including sediments and forests are common and frequently plentiful in free-living parasites. Certain species flourish in harsh conditions like thermal baths, liquid ammonia lakes and wetlands. Although every protozoon needs a moist environment to live in, some can endure prolonged dryness by developing resting cysts that allow them to hibernate until the situation changes. Parasites that are infected or symbiotic exist on or within other species, such as vertebrates, invertebrates, plants and other single-celled animals. Others, like babesia, malaria and toxoplasmosis, may be important causes of diseases. Some are benign or helpful to their host organisms. The interaction of protozoan symbionts with their host species can be advantageous to both parties. Termite’s stomachs are home to multicellular protozoa like Trichonympha and Pyrsonympha, which help break down complex carbohydrates into smaller, easier-to-digest compounds. In the rumens of ruminant animals like cattle and sheep, a broad variety of protozoa coexist. These include flagellates like Trichomonas and ciliated protozoa like Isotricha and Entodinium. All of the mouth less symbionts in the ciliate subclass Astomatia is adapted for life within annelid worms' guts.

All protozoa are heterotrophic, which means they obtain their nourishment from other living things whether by eating them whole with phagocytosis or by consuming dissolved organic substances or microscopic particles (osmotrophy). Pinocytosis may include ingesting food through a specialized mouth-like aperture known as a cytostome, swallowing organic particles with pseudopodia (as do amoebae) or employing a stiffened ingestion organelle. There are many distinct feeding tactics used by parasitic protozoa and some of them might alter as they progress through different stages of their life cycle. For example, the malaria parasite Plasmodium feeds through pinocytosis during its juvenile trophozoite stage of life when it grows inside a host's red blood cell, it forms a specific feeding organelle (cytostome). Microbes can also exist as distinctive characteristic, which combine an autotrophic diet with a mixotrophic one. The symbiotic photosynthetic algae (zoochlorellae), which live and grow inside the membranes of the bigger cell and supply nutrients to the host, create intimate connections with some protozoa. Instead of being metabolized, the algae proliferate are dispersed among the division products. Sometimes, the species may gain from getting some of its nutrients from the algae endophytes or from being able to survive anoxic circumstances oxygen created by algal photosynthesis.